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This is local politics. Need to keep the money flowing into NASA to keep the constituency happy, regardless of your party affiliation. Plus NASA's budget vs. the entire budget is close to nothing. Just like that recent budget "cut" the republicans were bragging about was like less than 1% savings on the entire budget. I guess you could say the victory is that it didn't go up, but whatever. Still seems pretty crappy.

This is local politics. Need to keep the money flowing into NASA to keep the constituency happy, regardless of your party affiliation. Plus NASA's budget vs. the entire budget is close to nothing. Just like that recent budget "cut" the republicans were bragging about was like less than 1% savings on the entire budget. I guess you could say the victory is that it didn't go up, but whatever. Still seems pretty crappy.

Exactly. NASA's budget [wikipedia.org] has generally been less than 1% of the national budget for well over a decade. Even if you cut all of NASA, is wouldn't have equalled the number of billions claimed for the most recent budget cut. NASA's budget was never was truly huge either, peaking at 4.4% during the Apollo era. I think people have historically overestimated just how much money is currently spent on NASA, all things considered.

That being said, this is not what we need at the moment. When NASA achieved the moon

Since a "socialist" got elected to office. Economics are not the Republicans' strong suit. They worship the guy who slashed taxes so much in the early 80s that he had to go back and reraise them almost every single year he was in office, but a Democrat wanting to let George Bush's tax cuts expire to help bring down the deficit they caused? Oh hell no.

You overestimate how interested in politics we Americans are. In general, people just like to have an opinion, and it's usually an uninformed one. That's not interest in politics, that's interest in ignorance and believing what we want to believe...and not even in the face of evidence to the contrary, because most of us don't want to know something that goes against what we believe so we don't inform ourselves. If it rocks our world-view, then that's baaaad...that's the liberal media agenda attacking our go

While I'm firmly of the stance that we need to drastically reduce spending (almost) across the board, this is the type of project I wish money would go to if it's going to be spent.

Trying to be ambiguous as to not divert the discussions focus, but spending on an endeavor that will ultimately benefit the entire nation as well as be a boon to science seems like a better use of funds than programs heavily favoring a specific subset of the nation. (Take that how you will, I have no particular program in mind.)

I'm guessing it's like the last 'humans should go the moon and then to mars' effort... a mandate with no funding attached.

The folks from Florida complain because they're seeing the shuttle program shutting down, and don't know what to do... but because of the requirement to keep the shuttle going, and no funding to cover it, many other NASA projects were shut down years ago to cover the costs.

Yes, there should be requirements to do interesting things, and that helps to drive people, but getting humans int

Of course, if we need to be pedantic, then I could say the first commercial launch vehicle ferrying any meaningful satellite to space (non nano hobby projects, like Sputnik for example.)

$270M is just step 1 of the incentive funding, and it's already 4.5% of $6B.

There needs to be a gradual transition from the present NASA to any self-sufficient privatized programs. Already in the Houston area, NASA contractors wear badges marked "HO", and remark "it means I work for whoever pays me." Programs shift from be

Many of the top "new" aerospace companies are already siphoning off the cream of the crop from many of these companies, including operations in Houston. That talent isn't going to waste, and I'd have to agree that there is a deep talent pool which does need to pass on the lessons learned from one generation to another. That is indeed a huge issue, so I don't want to minimize that.

Still, those involved with the manned spaceflight program at NASA have a dismal record of getting anything accomplished, where the last new design to actually make it into space has been the Space Shuttle, started in the Johnson administration and approved during the Nixon administration in terms of real funding. If the experience of nearly a dozen failed launcher projects is lost, it could even be said to be a good thing after a fashion. Something is certainly missing from what needs to happen as the object of the whole exercise, getting people into space, seems to be lost completely anymore. If the same worker bees keep shifting around from one nameless company to another, perhaps the whole system needs to be rethought.

I'm also going to acknowledge that there ought to be a transition after a fashion, as radical moves can throw out the baby with the bathwater. The question is more in terms of how gradual, and what it really means in terms of a privatized spaceflight system in America. Merely becoming another contractor to NASA doing what was done by government employees isn't really privatization, as opposed to a company who sell spaceflight services to NASA as a customer but also sells those same services to many other people who are not even government agencies. More significantly, private companies don't have to "spread the wealth" by putting offices in key congressional districts, but rather make the decision in terms of where to locate facilities based upon hard economic decisions to remain profitable.

The U.S. federal government is hitting a brick wall in terms of finances, and the train wreck is going to do far more than take out NASA. For myself, I wish that America had the money and the political will among the politicians in DC to be able to continue to fund NASA as it has for decades, and perhaps even go up to the 1960's levels of funding. Unfortunately cold hard reality is such that NASA is going to be an easy target with a weak constituency ripe to be wiped out in a budgetary compromise.... especially when programs like Head Start, Medicaid, and Social Security are also going to be hammered hard. If T-bills lose the AAA bond rating quality, expect that to get much worse before it gets better.

If I look at the US income, it looks like the problem is not the spending (despite the incredible ridiculous huge military budget) it is an income problem. The imbalance between ownership and tax is in no Western country that big. You really should start to tax the rich. Or run your country into the ground. Right now US politics have chosen to do the latter.

Or cut spending. As I see it, the crowd that wants us to increase taxes is currently outspending revenue by 10% of US GDP (that is, the 2010 US GDP in current dollars is roughly 15 trillion USD, while the current deficit (for FY 2011) is estimated as of January to be roughly 1.5 trillion USD). There have been similar deficits for the previous two fiscal years. I don't understand why fiscal responsibility is such a difficult to comprehend topic.

I find it rather odd that Americans pay significantly less tax than most westerner's and spend significantly more time time complaining about it.

Keep in mind that US citizens also pay local and state taxes. For some locations, such as New York City, the tax level can be comparable to the heavier taxed parts of Europe. Second, most US citizens have lower expectations about what they want out of government and hence, much less interest in funding US government at say, EU levels. Needless to say, these expectations are met.

Finally, I notice that a good portion of the developed world has been experimenting with unusually high taxes for a few decades.

All the co-sponsors have major NASA operations in their states. Rep. Rob Bishop has repeatedly tried to save ATK Technology in Promontory, UT, the exclusive manufacturer of the solid rocket boosters used in the space shuttle program and the biggest employer in his district.

The largest employer in his district is the Weber County School District, but otherwise I'd have to agree with your position on Rob Bishop. The guy is a sell-out, and is partly responsible for a $3 billion earmark (nearly the only one in the current budget) for the "SLS" launch system (often dubbed the "Senate Launch System") to essentially restart under a new name the Ares V project.

It is useful to note that the ATK plant was in his Utah State House of Representatives district before he was elected to his current seat in Washington, thus has a rather cozy relationship with the people in that company as well as many neighbors who work for them as well.

One legitimate issue that needs to be addressed is in terms of how to keep domestic production going for the Ammonium Perchlorate [wikipedia.org], which is a vital chemical needed for general defense purposes. That is the primary chemical used in solid rocket boosters, and is used for most of the ICBMs in the arsenal of the United States (as well as the missiles in submarines). Right now, those missiles aren't being built, so there is a need for at least somebody, somewhere, to be using this chemical so that the factories making this rocket fuel can keep going for when the ICBM fleet needs to be refurbished for the next generation (the fuel is unstable and does need to be replaced periodically).

My personal solution to the problem: Rather than disguising a NASA program as something other than a make-work jobs program to keep the factory workers at these chemical plants employed, why not simply get into the business of making 4th of July fireworks and literally give these "missiles" to every city in America for their annual celebrations? $3-$4 billion would make a whole lot of fireworks, and it could at least be enjoyed for pure entertainment purposes by most Americans if they want to see their tax dollars literally burned up every year. You could even keep rocket developers busy, where they would be able to "test fly" their designs on a regular basis. That is much more to say that to have a bunch of rocket developers design a vehicle that will never fly due to an eventual shift in priorities, political parties, and mismanagement that usually accompanies most NASA rocket development projects.

Rob Bishop is rated as "the most conservative representatives in the U.S. House" and is one who constantly calls for fiscal responsibility and decrying earmarks of other members of congress as being wasteful. I call that hypocrisy at the very least.

If Bishop was running on the platform of "bringing the bacon home to Utah" (as his fellow member in the Utah delegation, Orrin Hatch, did for his 2006 re-election campaign), it would be a bit more understandable. Sadly, he complains when others do that kind of

This bill is an attempt to revive the failed SLS space launcher based on space shuttle parts. Here's the relevant text in the bill:

(3) The 111th Congress, in the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Authorization Act of 2010, called for the development of a heavy lift capability of greater than 130 metric tons consisting of the Space Launch System (SLS) and Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) to pursue exploration, yet fell short on explicitly stating a clear destination.

(4) The 112th Congress has reaffirmed this commitment to the development of a heavy lift capability.

A few months ago a senator from Utah tried to get NASA to stop looking for alternatives to the SLS (such as SpaceX) by citing the 130 ton requirement. Now they're trying to pass a new bill with stronger wording to force NASA to spend money on the SLS, which happens to be built in their states.

... if he didn't have a purely selfish agenda because it would just happen to directly benefit his state/district economically long before we'd even get there, and even if it gets cancelled later and we don't.

Here's an idea, we can launch all of our seniors to the moon and get rid of our Social Security and Medicare spending deficits. Call it "Use Space to Make Space" program. Maybe redefine AARP as the "Astronaut Association for Retired People."

Translation: "to restart the space race, bring in jobs to my home state, and billions of dollars in spending to defense contractors."

I realize this is/. and is, therefore, reactionary to anything with an (R), but is it possible, even a little bit possible, that this Congressman really supports technological research? Could it be possible that he is more knowledgeable about such things precisely because he is from Florida and is therefore better educated about the United States' space program (being genuinely concerned for his constituents)? Is it possible that his motives are genuine and not simply political?

A socialist like Kennedy wanting to get to the moon by a socialist government program, I can understand. But a Republican? Surely we should just wait until GE or Boeing just picks up and goes with private money and objectives. It will be much more efficiently run, and no taxpayers will be robbed to give a (literally) free ride to socialist astronauts.

After reading all my Pournelle and Niven in the 70's, I've been waiting 40 years for the power of free enterprise to get me a ticket on the Pan Am Space Clipper. I'm not sure what the hold-up is; probably, the corporations are still too highly taxed.

Kennedy was more conservative then reagan, poppa bush, or W. Back then they could balance budgets. Now, we have uneducated masses voting in neo-cons who speak of balancing budgets, stopping illegals,and getting to the moon, but do the exact opposite. Sadly, these followers ignore results and simply listen to rhetoric. Neo-cons have fucked up education in America. Hell, reagan and W grew gov more than all other president EXCEPT for lincoln and FDR who were dealing with real issues.

Speaking of FDR, FWIW, despite all the hype, many economists say that he fucked up the economy worse than it fucked up itself while trying to fix it (prolonging it by about 7 years, according to some UCLA dudes; consult your local economist for more opinions). And no, I'm not talking things like Social Security... I'm talking things like the boneheaded Agricultural Adjustment Act and freakish levels of price controls.

The SLS is a joke and should be dropped. If we do COTS-SHLV for 2 vehicles (140 tonnes to LEO, 5 billion or less for build out and below 400 million to launch), then we can do a sustained base. In addtion, we need to get Bigelow and IDC Dover going with both of their space stations (which are actually transhabs).

If a Democrat had presented this bill the majority of Slashdotters here would be fauning over how this would stimulate the economy, create jobs and advance science. But since the political partisanship here is so pathetic, it's clearly some type of evil corporate money grab.

1-Manned space flight serves no scientific purpose, is expensive, and puts people at risk without cause. If we really wanted a public works project to help the world how about terraforming the sahara desert or building cities under water.
2-the USA is deeply in debt and going deeper by the second, you really can't afford it. If you can't afford universal health care you certainly can't afford space flight.
3-it's hard to plan ahead when you don't know if your project will be funded after the next election. What about the people you put up there?
4-there are only 2 tasks that could justify a permanent lunar base: astronomy (big telescope without interference) and solar panel production (launch into earth orbit, in bulk it's cheaper than earth launches).

Yes, it's clearly a troll. But the research in closed environments and recycling for space flight have already borne fruit, as have the materials research in lightweight alloys and ceramics used for space flight. Information solar radiation, weather monitoring, and terrain and oean mapping have already paid off the space program costs, including manned spacef flight, by huge factors. Increased communications from the satellite networks have also more than paid for space flight.

In a country which is trillions of dollars in debt, which apparently cannot afford to offer national healthcare like others do in the UK and Canada but CAN afford to bail out the heads of banks who've screwed the US population out of their children's future can somehow come up with the rationale to send people to the moon because?
Common sense is clearly gone today. I don't know what the hell anyone in government thinks anymore

Step 1: Mandate that NASA's mission is pure "research and exploration science"Step 2: Open up the floodgates for private use of space.Step 3: Remove *ALL* government mandates on NASA other than the four words articulated in step 1.Step 4: Let NASA do its thing.

End result (hopefully:) We see NASA do pure science, for science sake (robotic missions to planets, asteroids, etc,) we see NASA do supported-by-cheaper-commercially-viable-companies manned exploration. No more "this Senator says he has to have 20 jobs, so we subcontract this minor part out to an incompetent vendor, this Representative says she has to have the bragging rights of this subcomponent being in her district" and so-on and so-on.

Atlantis shouldn't be at KSC, Enterprise shouldn't be in NYC, and Endeavor shouldn't go to CSC. Those are all purely political decisions. Get politics out of NASA, it has caused decades of harm as it is.

How about paying the government deficit that is about to default in a month so humans can habitat Earth first

Because if man is to survive as a species, we must leave this planet. To leave this planet, we must advance the state of the art. To advance the state of the art, we must spend money on human space exploration/colonization.

Deficits will never go away, and neither will the fact that the sun will eventually incinerate the earth.

How about paying the government deficit that is about to default in a month so humans can habitat Earth first

Because if man is to survive as a species, we must leave this planet. To leave this planet, we must advance the state of the art. To advance the state of the art, we must spend money on human space exploration/colonization.

Deficits will never go away, and neither will the fact that the sun will eventually incinerate the earth.

I agree that we need space exploration but as an Australian I am not going to demand that it be funded by US taxpayers. The fact is that Mercury, Gemini and Apollo were funded by the cold war and this funding is long gone. It was gone in the early 1970s and its not coming back. Fortunately a lot of good research and development was done in the 1950s and 60s. Launches are cheaper and more reliable now. Maybe the gap has been closed and exploration money can come from private sources. I think that is the only way space exploration will get beyond flags and footprints.

I hate to say it but nationalism and religion were the drivers of exploration in the past. Maybe this will happen in space.

Would you rather have them down here carving up the earth, or up there making money in space. Space is big...really big so big thateven greedy corporations cant use it up for a very long long long time.

Because the current greedy business model we have down here has a bright future.

And that's the thing that routinely is ignored. The so-called "greedy" business model works because it gives a channel for so-called "greedy" people to contribute to society in a meaning and positive way. The future is indeed brighter.

The so-called "multinational" (the label which includes any business that operates in two or more countries) will have to buy space-based goods and services to support its claims and it'll have to come with profitable enterprises (which contribute to society) with which to

Recent evidence would seem to suggest that said greedy people do not wind up contributing in a meaningful way, but instead wind up finding every edge case they can to try to skim off the productivity of others.

As opposed to sitting here while governments bask in bureaucracy? Say what you will about commercial interests, unless there is a war on commercial interests have been the driving force of many discoveries and innovations, not governments.

Business is better at incremental innovation, not so good at disruptive innovations like computers, the atom bomb, the internet (all funded by govt). Biz is too focussed on next quarter's shareholders' report to invest enough in the long-term R&D that creates truly disruptive innovations. So govt should deficit-spend if necessary to keep the disruptive innovations coming, which can then be turned over to biz to improve incrementally and bring to the masses. Synergy! As long as we keep advancing knowledg

Nope. Outer Space Treaty makes it impossible to recover the costs of exploration, since you're not allowed to actually claim anything up there as belonging to you.

What you say is, of course, true. However, it's worth pointing out that pretty much every country has a history of ignoring its treaties when it's in its own best interest and when it thinks it can get away with it.

None of the listed countries come even close to desirable launch areas. Essentially the best location for launch is at equator.

The point being made is that private interests could build a space center in one of the equatorial countries in Africa or Central America. While unrealistic in current political and financial climate, it would be doable, and they would even have a meaningful advantage over existing launch sites because of location allowing for less energy needed per launched tonnage.

Note that the Outer Space Treaty only requires that a signatory nation announce at least a year in advance that they are going to withdraw from the treaty. If the political will is there to have a country like the United States to claim extra-terrestrial real estate, it can easily happen and no other signatory nation can do a thing about it.... shy of going to war over the issue.

If the technology exists to be able to mine an extra-terrestrial body or do anything else in space, it can be done. Besides, com

Because if man is to survive as a species, we must leave this planet. To leave this planet, we must advance the state of the art. To advance the state of the art, we must spend money on human space exploration/colonization.

Deficits will never go away, and neither will the fact that the sun will eventually incinerate the earth.

If your worried about the sun going nova, then take a couple of deep breaths and relax. We've got time. Although I strongly support the space program, we would do better as a species if we realized that we're NOT getting off this rock anytime soon and we'd best spend some energy keeping what we've got habitable.

Supporting the space program could be done without materially increasing the deficit (NASA takes up some tiny fraction of the US budget at present). But it really bugs me when congresscritters put up stupid bills like this one. You get all sorts of earmarks and pork embedded in it, you get NASA (or whatever organization) pulled in all sorts of usually contradictory ways. You get things changing from year to year. If someone came up with a bill that funded NASA with x% of the Federal Budget for 50 years, maybe I could go for that but the current bill is just grandstanding and appeasing his constituents.

Given the historical location of much NASA activity, and the introduction of the bill by the senator for Florida, it would probably be more efficient to pick out the parts that aren't pork than the ones that are.

Earmarks just direct the funding to specific sources, which is the point of having a representative, it's doesn't increase funding at all.

So the point of having representatives is to make sure the government cannot complete its mandated missions efficiently? What you describe is what we call an "unfunded mandate", and we in the civil service dread those like the plague. It means that we don't get enough money to do our jobs properly because half of our "budget" is directed toward boondoggles in one state or another.

The trouble with earmarks is they all too frequently result in "We will give you $20 million to do a $30 million job that woul

The representatives decide WHAT the agencies need to accomplish to improve society. That's their job. They know what their constituents want, they know what the societal and economic impact of certain objectives are (or at least they're supposed to), so they decide what goals need furthering--better health care, better technology, better financial regulation, etc.

The agencies decide HOW to do it. That's *their* job. They don't just blindly do whatever Congress says. They know the specific details of t

Here is a paper from 15 years ago from the University of New South Wales.

The above summary shows that energy payback times for modules incorporating thick silicon cells are, at worst, of the order of six to seven years and possibly less than three years. Since warranty periods of 20 years are routinely offered on such modules[ ] it is clear that the embodied energy should be easily recovered.

Energy payback estimates for rooftop PV systems are 4, 3, 2,and 1 years: 4 years for systems using current multicrystalline-silicon PV modules, 3 years for current thin-film modules,2 years for anticipated multicrystalline modules, and1 year for anticipated thin-film modules (see Figure 1).With energy paybacks of 1 to 4 years and assumed lifeexpectancies of 30 years, 87% to 97% of the energy thatPV systems generate won’t be plagued by pollution, greenhousegases, and depletion of resources.

How about paying the government deficit that is about to default in a month so humans can habitat Earth first

Because if man is to survive as a species, we must leave this planet. To leave this planet, we must advance the state of the art. To advance the state of the art, we must spend money on human space exploration/colonization.

Deficits will never go away, and neither will the fact that the sun will eventually incinerate the earth.

Why must we leave the planet? Nothing is going to happen to it. The Earth is a lot tougher than we are, and will be here for a long long time, so "man is destroying Earth" isn't a reason. Are you betting on the mother of comets or asteroids hitting?

As far as deficits not going away, uh, yes, they can. It's just a matter of will. In fact, I say to you that, one way or the other, deficits are going away soon. Because either we're going to get our fiscal house in order and cut our budgets, or we're simply goin

GP's concern with a nova or supernova seems to me to be displaced - but I am betting on that mother of all asteroids. Somewhere out there, I'm quite certain that there is a rock on a collision course with the earth. It may or may not be large enough to "destroy the earth" - but it doesn't need to be that big to "end life as we know it" on earth. There is evidence of previous rocks, one of them in Siberia, one in the Gulf of Mexico, that were truly devastating, with global implications. Other less devast

a rock on a collision course with the earth. It may or may not be large enough to "destroy the earth" - but it doesn't need to be that big to "end life as we know it" on earth.

And yet, even after surviving an asteroid impact sufficient to destroy "life as we know it" or a full-on nuclear war, what remains of Earth will still be a million times more habitable than Mars.

We simply don't need colonies in space to ensure the continuance of the human race. If going all survivalist is what lights your fire, just build a sealed bio-dome in a mineshaft in Texas. It will be orders of magnitude cheaper, you'll get free oxygen and dirt to start with, and as a bonus, you'll get to find out whether it's even possible to build a self-sustaining colony. And if that answer turns out to be "no" (as it did for Biosphere 2 [wikipedia.org]), you can jump out the escape hatch without needing a working billion dollar rocket and a nine-month wait.

Space is not magic fairy dust which will make unworkable science or uneconomic technology spring into life. If sealed colonies in a can are possible, they're possible right here on Earth, for cheaper.

The colony is attainable in the near future - like the next 50 years. All that is required are funds, and people willing to endure some hardship. We had the means to put people on the moon about 40 years ago. Larger, more modern rockets could be built, capable of lifting materials up there to build a habitat inside one of those many vents. Supplies will be a problem at first, of course. Initially, all food, all water, all atmosphere, everything will have to be lifted. But, given only a few dozen peopl

The Earth is a lot tougher than we are, and will be here for a long long time, so "man is destroying Earth" isn't a reason.

If you mean that the pile of crushed metal is still 'technically' a car sure we aren't destroying the earth. We are destroying the environment we absolutely need to survive. That's pretty much what people mean when "we're destroying the earth".

Just so you know, the US isn't going to default its debt. Thats silly speculation from the conservative press thats led to a bit of nervousness from some isolated quarters because the statuatory debt limit is being reached.

But its just a debt limit, its got nothing to do with defaulting what so over, because pushing the default button would nuke the economy and the whitehouse knows it. It simply won't happen.

The US economy is still held to be a low risk of defaulting, simply because it doesn't need to, as it can just go austere instead. Or raise the limit.

Of course austerity is going to suck, because spending cuts wreck economies that are slumping, but life goes on.

If you ask me, its about time the US pulled out of a few wars and cashed in that peace dividend.

Yeah, but there isn't a need for hurry with that. Earth isn't getting wiped out anytime soon and even if, we neither have found another habitable planet nor the technology to get there. Toying around on the moon won't change that.

If you are worried about survival of mankind at this point in time it would make a hell of a lot more sense to build a few huge underground bunker so that you have some protection against an asteroid.

That whole "lets get to the moon for mankind survival" talk always feels for me li

Because if man is to survive as a species, we must leave this planet... the sun will eventually incinerate the earth.

I'm not sure you've thought this through.

Sure, on a timescale of millions of years, the sun will burn out - and the only solution will not be just to leave the planet, but the entire solar system, which would require either some form of faster-than-light physics breakthrough, or a generation ship. Living on which would require developing ecological sustainability skills because it will have very limited resources. Those pesky Greenies! They've infiltrated even our shiny Space Future!

You mean an event that will not happen for millions of years as in 2029 and 2036 [nasa.gov]?
Just because the likelihood is low doesn't mean it won't happen tomorrow. Frankly, humans themselves are a *lot* more likely to make Earth uninhabitable and a lot faster than a million years.

Then we're already screwed. I don't feel compelled to send some government selected Aryan to populate space.

SHRINK: Why were you up in the tree?
YOSSARIAN: Because I don't want to fly any more missions.
SHRINK: Hmmm. But we're at war fighting against a danagerous and ruthless enemy.
YOSSARIAN: Well, while I'm getting shot at here, there are lots of guys back home, going out with girls, drinking and having a good time, and I don't see why I shouldn't too.
SHRINK: But what if everyone felt that way...wh

Another aspect to the diversification argument is that there are plenty of large scale disasters that would be less harmful and easier to weather with an economy enlarged by a space presence. Global-scale economic messes happen at least once a decade, maybe more often. The more of your economy that doesn't depend on real estate financial instruments and hedge funds (or whatever the fad is this time) then the better your economy can weather these man-made train wrecks.

So you want to go back into space? the top tax rate MUST go back to 90%

This is a non sequitur. What's government going to do that has anything to do with space? Never mind that I, at best, advocate a vast cutback in government spending, including space activities. Those "rich" are going to have to be the ones (they'd be the only interesting examples anyway) investing not government.

Instead what we are gonna have is a full on collapse, we will be NO different than the PIIGS in Europe, mark my words.

And the PIGS (I'm excluding Ireland out of a sense of optimism that they'll figure out cause and effect of their bank bailouts) are that way because the "rich" aren't pulling their fair share? Rathe

Uh huh...to quote Mel Brooks bullshit bullshit aaaaand bullshit. maybe you'd care to explain how a full 2/3rds of corps paid NO taxes this decade [nytimes.com] or how GE, who paid paid NO taxes in 2010 [go.com] and in fact got a REBATE and is now using those funds to fire Americans and build overseas [truthdig.com] with the head of GE actually having the brass balls to say "We've globalized around markets, not cheap labor. The era of globalization around cheap labor is over. Today we go to China, we go to India, because that's where the customers are."

BULLSHIT and EVERY single time of growth in the history of this country TAXES AT THE TOP HAVE BEEN OVER 70% full stop. We have had unprecedented tax breaks for the top 1% for THIRTY YEARS and NOTHING has gotten better. NOTHING. So peddle the rep fantasy somewhere else, we ain't buying it no more. America WILL BE COME NATIONALIST the only question is how violent the change over will be. China is about to drop their US dollars so the game is over friend, time to pay the check.

Money has no intrinsic value. It only stands for what you want to imagine it stands for. If ildon chooses to ignore that artificial construct, arguing that your construct is "real" doesn't make little green pieces of cloth any more valuable to him.

The government holds much of the world's wealth in bonds and the tax payers end up paying for it on interest. If it defaults we could expect a 16% interest like Greece and many Grandma's 401ks and even your home mortgage will be effected. This is because the banks have money in bonds paying for the deficit and will have to raise rates and deny loans to people and businesses that hire if they lose money. Your 401k may even have companies that have a certa

No one is going to be unable to inhabit earth just because a government runs out of it. Worst comes to worst you can just grow some crops and hunt some small game. You're not going to fall over dead just because you're $10 trillion in debt. Unless someone murders you over it, I guess.

What does this even mean? We're living quite well on earth. This is the height of human civilization. Why not keep pushing to greater heights? Yeah, I get your point that we could take all the money for manned space industry and buy rice and send it to all the starving people on the planet. That's very noble and all...but we're always going to have these kinds of problems on earth. Diverting money from the manned space program for humanitarian purposes isn't going to change much. Population control i

More than enough reason to explore and colonize space. You should look at a culture in a petrie dish sometime. The organisms consume all the resources available, then start producing the very poisons that will kill off the culture. That's us. We're over crowded already, and it's only going to get worse.

And it's even more addicting. They really pitch a fit when they don't get what they think they're supposed to get. Here locally they're bitching about the end of an "occupational tax" that years ago was supposed to be temporary and recently ruled illegal. So, they've shut down our convenient satellite courthouses to get our "attention" for the need for another tax increase. Assholes all.

Because that's the point. We don't send rovers and robots to the Moon because we're all that interested in the science. We're not as a whole. We're doing it because some day, we'll have a lot of people in space and whatever we do on the Moon, whether it involves people directly or not, will support that.